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Should Schools of Magic Be Proficiencies?
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<blockquote data-quote="Quickleaf" data-source="post: 8996726" data-attributes="member: 20323"><p>This approach has a lot in common with the Spheres of Power or Domain Casters from older editions – less breadth, more depth. It also, effectively, shares common ground with Equip-to-Cast systems like we see in Final Fantasy or certain OSR variants (Cairn maybe? can't recall atm).</p><p></p><p></p><p>For the idea of "spells as skills", there's an <em>Old School Essentials</em> "mage" class that was published for the official <em>OSE Carcass Crawler zine</em> which does this exactly. It's a great starting point if you're homebrewing something.</p><p></p><p>Basically, it takes the idea of thief skills (which have an X in d6 chance of succeeding in OSE) and maps Gandalf-like magic to that system. The magic skills are Detect Magic, Open/Close, Rally/Fear, Read Magic, and Suggestion. Then they give a few extras like light at-will, a boost to AC, being able to hit monsters immune to mundane attacks, a little healing, etc.</p><p></p><p></p><p>I love it, but Roll-to-cast tends to divide D&D players. Some people love it, some people hate it. If it's just for your table, do what makes you guys happy of course, but if it's for wider dissemination, consider avoiding "if you fail the roll, the spell fizzles."</p><p></p><p>I have a homebrew option for wizards that I borrowed/adapted from Jason Lutes' awesome <em>Freebooters on the Frontier </em>playtest that uses a roll-to-cast BUT the penalty for failure is never "you don't cast the spell", rather it's more "undesirable things also happen when you do." I think that's an important thing to bear in mind to make any roll-to-cast house rule more palatable (if disseminating the house rule beyond your table matters to you).</p><p></p><p>However, Jason Lutes' system & my adaptation are basically throwing codified spells out the window and going for something much more freewheeling that most D&D groups probably wouldn't be down with.</p><p></p><p></p><p>That's an interesting and flavorful idea! But distinguishing which language is associated with which school would be a nightmare... kinda like Spell Schools are a nightmare (some spells belonging to a school make perfect sense, others on the fence, others seem out of left field).</p><p></p><p></p><p>These are definitely YMMV ideas. For instance, I like to encourage players to experiment, research, have identify, rely on bards / sages when it comes to magic items, so Arcana-to-Identify is less appealing if it's an "all or nothing, meet or beat DC" approach.</p><p></p><p>I'm pretty sure <em>Tasha's Cauldron of Everything</em> already attaches Arcana (and other skills) to specific monster knowledge checks. Personally not a fan, but there's an existing system in place now, if you want to use or adapt it.</p><p></p><p>The other ideas could be fun.</p><p></p><p></p><p>I recall a wizard player in AD&D getting really frustrated with failing % chance to learn new spell checks. I never found the rule worth the headache or frustration. IF you wanted to implement something like this, it would be more interesting not to make consequence of failure "you fail to learn the spell" but maybe some change to the spell or some weird quirk when you cast it (that's leaning more into weird magic tables that you can find all over the OSR).</p><p></p><p></p><p>These idea are controversial, but if they synch up with what your group likes, they can be a lot of fun. Definitely look at the OSR for inspiration (<em>Dungeon Crawl Classics</em> does this to the max,<em> Shadowdark</em> is a lite version), where roll-to-cast is being implemented in various ways. I have two class variations that I've developed, one for Sorcerer and one for Wizard, which utilize roll-to-cast in different ways - if you get far enough along and want to look at my approach, feel free to ask.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Quickleaf, post: 8996726, member: 20323"] This approach has a lot in common with the Spheres of Power or Domain Casters from older editions – less breadth, more depth. It also, effectively, shares common ground with Equip-to-Cast systems like we see in Final Fantasy or certain OSR variants (Cairn maybe? can't recall atm). For the idea of "spells as skills", there's an [I]Old School Essentials[/I] "mage" class that was published for the official [I]OSE Carcass Crawler zine[/I] which does this exactly. It's a great starting point if you're homebrewing something. Basically, it takes the idea of thief skills (which have an X in d6 chance of succeeding in OSE) and maps Gandalf-like magic to that system. The magic skills are Detect Magic, Open/Close, Rally/Fear, Read Magic, and Suggestion. Then they give a few extras like light at-will, a boost to AC, being able to hit monsters immune to mundane attacks, a little healing, etc. I love it, but Roll-to-cast tends to divide D&D players. Some people love it, some people hate it. If it's just for your table, do what makes you guys happy of course, but if it's for wider dissemination, consider avoiding "if you fail the roll, the spell fizzles." I have a homebrew option for wizards that I borrowed/adapted from Jason Lutes' awesome [I]Freebooters on the Frontier [/I]playtest that uses a roll-to-cast BUT the penalty for failure is never "you don't cast the spell", rather it's more "undesirable things also happen when you do." I think that's an important thing to bear in mind to make any roll-to-cast house rule more palatable (if disseminating the house rule beyond your table matters to you). However, Jason Lutes' system & my adaptation are basically throwing codified spells out the window and going for something much more freewheeling that most D&D groups probably wouldn't be down with. That's an interesting and flavorful idea! But distinguishing which language is associated with which school would be a nightmare... kinda like Spell Schools are a nightmare (some spells belonging to a school make perfect sense, others on the fence, others seem out of left field). These are definitely YMMV ideas. For instance, I like to encourage players to experiment, research, have identify, rely on bards / sages when it comes to magic items, so Arcana-to-Identify is less appealing if it's an "all or nothing, meet or beat DC" approach. I'm pretty sure [I]Tasha's Cauldron of Everything[/I] already attaches Arcana (and other skills) to specific monster knowledge checks. Personally not a fan, but there's an existing system in place now, if you want to use or adapt it. The other ideas could be fun. I recall a wizard player in AD&D getting really frustrated with failing % chance to learn new spell checks. I never found the rule worth the headache or frustration. IF you wanted to implement something like this, it would be more interesting not to make consequence of failure "you fail to learn the spell" but maybe some change to the spell or some weird quirk when you cast it (that's leaning more into weird magic tables that you can find all over the OSR). These idea are controversial, but if they synch up with what your group likes, they can be a lot of fun. Definitely look at the OSR for inspiration ([I]Dungeon Crawl Classics[/I] does this to the max,[I] Shadowdark[/I] is a lite version), where roll-to-cast is being implemented in various ways. I have two class variations that I've developed, one for Sorcerer and one for Wizard, which utilize roll-to-cast in different ways - if you get far enough along and want to look at my approach, feel free to ask. [/QUOTE]
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